Somewhere, Deep Down
by Jazzola
Summary: Living with a disabled brother is hard. Maybe Fred stopped caring when his parents stopped bothering so much with him. But maybe he always cared, somewhere... Based on my family experience with my brother. Just a random little one-shot. Summary's rubbish.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: This came to me in a flash (although that may have been me tripping over the power cord :P) a few minutes ago and I thought it would be good… Just a little oneshot based slightly on me. My brother has Asperger's so I've always been a bit of a second priority in my house and I know the feeling so well I thought I'd get this down… Anyway, read and enjoy. It's not from the point of any of the gang, it's from Lucas's point of view. Lucas is Fred's brother, and he has brain damage, so he is in a wheelchair and takes up a lot of Mrs Jones's time. It's not really my scenario, but it's a little similar… Still. Remember to review, because I love reviews.

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Mom's lifting me into my chair as I wake up, gurgling to let her know I'm awake. I can't do much except gurgle. I don't have a normal brain like everyone else; mine is damaged, different. It means I can't walk and I can't talk. I've always been this way, but Mom and Dad don't mind. Mitchell doesn't mind.

Fred, on the other hand…

Fred is my older brother by one year. I guess it's quite hard on him, me being me. I'm reliant on other people and so Mom and Dad are always busy with me, never with Fred. I want to tell them to leave me be for five minutes and talk to him, do something with him. When he looks at me his eyes change. They're normally placid, calm, quiet. But they become angry, jealous, usurped when he looks at me.

I can guess how he feels.

Mom straps me in firmly and turns away to wheel me out for breakfast. I can smell bacon and when we go in, Dad's busy at the stove and Mitchell's munching on some toast. He doesn't like bacon, but he likes the smell. Fred's bounding up and down in the middle of the kitchen, hyper. Like he should be. A kid. Like he should be.

He looks at me and stops bouncing, turning away so I can't see his face. Mitchell smiles at me but he doesn't face me again and only nods when Dad asks if he's OK.

"You want some bacon, Lucas-Superhero?" Dad asks. It's his nickname for me. I nod- a recently acquired skill- and he plops the bacon onto a plate and hands it to Mom.

Fred turns and sighs, quietly but loudly enough for me to hear. I can almost hear him think, _Usurped again. The second priority again. _My heart goes out in sympathy for him. I don't care when he's mean to me, although sometimes he upsets me. I don't think it's his fault. I always forgive him.

I don't know why he won't forgive me.

"I'll do yours in a minute, Fred," Dad says, turning to the fridge and getting out my breakfast plate. He caters to me first, tucking my bib in, brushing my hair out of my eyes and just fussing until Mom's feeding me the bacon. Then he shoves the manky bottom slice of bacon in for Fred and barely even tends to it. Fred pouts angrily in the corner. I try to give him a smile but I don't manage it and I receive a scowl in return. His eyes flash at me furiously and I see them change.

"There," Dad says, plonking it on the plate and shoving it in front of him before turning to clean some bacon rind off my front. Fred scowls again and shoves the whole rasher into his mouth. I gasp as he starts choking, and Dad turns and whacks him on the back, harder than was needed.

"Honestly! Silly child," he thunders. "I was looking after your brother!"

Tears spring into Fred's eyes and into mine as well as I see the hurt on his face. He turns and runs out of the back door, and Dad looks after him with maybe a slightly guilty look on his face.

"Fred's just in one of his moods," Mom says smoothly, and Dad nods and turns back to me. I shake my head and scowl.

"You don't want any more?"

I shake my head. My appetite has vanished along with my brother.

"Don't let Fred upset you," Mom says softly. "He's just a bit moody sometimes."

I shake my head again impatiently. If only I could speak, just for one minute, to tell them the truth. Or are they blind? Are they blocking it out?

I watch as Fred kicks over a garden ornament in his temper and leaps onto the swing, pushing it so high that it nearly loops over the top of the frame. Normally he's pacified, but when something like this happens he becomes… different. And it's all my fault.

I can't help the way I am. But I hate it. Not just that I can't be normal. That it hurts him. He used to be so nice to me, but then we grew up and he started hating me because I was the reason he was ignored.

Mom wheels me through to the lounge and parks me in front of the TV. She puts on a cartoon and I watch it, remembering Fred playing with me when I was little, acting along to this cartoon. He made me laugh and it made him happy.

I don't think he's ever happy now.

I fall asleep in front of the cartoon, and wake up when a ball hits the window. I yell, thinking it's something horrible, something big- but it's just Fred, kicking it around. Mom stands up and starts shouting at him.

"You woke Lucas up! You silly boy!"

"Lucas Lucas Lucas! Always Lucas!" Fred yells before storming off. Mom soothes me, but inside it's not the ball that's making me feel bad now, it's the fact that I got Fred into trouble.

I sleep again, until lunch. Fred is still sulky, but he went and played with his friend Shaggy so he's feeling better. I like Shaggy; he shares his food with me very carefully and plays with me and makes me laugh. Fred is always silent when he's playing with me, but sometimes he smiles as well. Shaggy was unsure of me at first, but he was only little and he'd never seen anyone like me before.

"Did you have a good time with Shaggy?" Mom asks him. He just nods. Silent again. Recently Fred has been living in three modes: normal, silent and angry. This is silent. He's rarely in normal anymore.

"What did you do? Were you playing? Did you involve Sugey?"

Shrug, shrug, shake of the head. Fred is really being silent today.

"Why won't you ever talk, Freddy?" Mitchell asks suddenly, looking up from his plate at Fred. Fred shrugs and I gurgle. _I know why, _I want to say. _It's because of me. _Fred gives me half a look and I'm glad to see that his eyes are normal.

"Are you OK, Lucas?" Mom asks, giving up on Fred and turning to me. Fred's eyes darken and he looks away.

"OK then," Dad says, reaching out and putting his hand on Fred's plate. "You can have your food back when you tell us what the matter is."

"You!" Fred says angrily. Now he's in angry mode and I can feel my mouth drying. "You always ignore me or shout at me and you're always talking about Lucas and doing stuff with Lucas and it's never me."

"That's not fair, Fred. Lucas needs more care than you."

"Yeah, it's not fair. You're never fair!" Fred yells. He pushes the chair back so hard it falls over and dents the fridge.

"You pick that up this second, Frederick, or you're in your room for the whole day!" Dad thunders. Fred gives an insolent shrug and makes to dart past Dad, but Dad grabs him and slings him over his shoulder, beginning to carry him upstairs. Fred starts shrieking, kicking at Dad's back.

"I warned you," Dad says coldly, and I can hear him screaming all the way up the stairs.

"It's not fair! You're not fair! I hate you, I hate you all!" Fred yells as Dad shuts him in his room. Dad comes back down, breathing heavily.

"I wish he was better behaved," he says to nobody in particular, sitting back down and tucking my bib back in. He picks up his knife and fork only to put them back down again as a loud bang comes from upstairs and Fred yells, "I hate you! ALL OF YOU!" as loudly as he can. He'll have a sore throat now. I wince as he screams it at the top of his lungs.

"What an immature little child," Mom says, picking up my food and putting a piece of bagel in my mouth. I want to spit it out again but it wouldn't help me or Fred and so I swallow it.

Fred is silent for the rest of the day. He refuses to speak even to say that he wants dessert, so he goes without. I get the feeling he doesn't care.

"Why are you being so moody today, Freddy?" Mom asks him gently, putting her hand on his arm. He pulls his arm out from under her hand and goes back up to his room.

"I've had it up to here with that child and his moods," Dad says, sighing.

I gurgle. I want to say, _Then pay him more attention. _But I can't. Mitchell looks up and smiles at me before going back to his dessert.

Mom takes me upstairs to sleep and the last thing I think is, _Will Fred still be mad at me tomorrow? _before I'm asleep.

Morning comes and he isn't moody anymore, but he isn't normal either. A new mode. I can't do so many things so a lot of my time is spent looking at other people. If I was normal I would be a good- what are they called? Brain doctor. Someone who looks at behaviour and stuff like that. It begins with sy.

"Are you going to go and pick up the new puppy with Shaggy?" Mom asks him. He nods, giving a brief smile. Mom leans down and lifts his chin up, wiping a smear of dirt off his cheek.

"Get off, it's fine!" he croaks. Mom frowns at him, but not angry like usual, more thinking.

"Are you OK? You've been so moody and annoyed and angry recently and it's not like you. Is someone giving you trouble at school?"

"No."

"Are you sure? I'm not convinced."

"Yeah."

Mom sighs, but she lets him grab his jacket and meet up with the others outside, Shaggy and Velma and Daphne. Velma is nice as well. She smiles at me and feeds me M&Ms. Daphne doesn't really talk to me that much. She doesn't walk away from me or anything but she doesn't know how to act around me and generally just smiles as well. I don't mind. I just smile back.

"You behave, and don't you be in one of your moods," Mom warns him as he walks over to them and high-fives Shaggy, laughing. He ignores her, just nodding, but Mrs Rogers looks at her curiously.

"Moods? He's the sunniest little boy you could wish for when he's playing with my Norville."

"Well, he's not been himself recently, it's getting to me a bit. I'm not really sure what it is, but I suppose I'll find out sooner or later. Anyway. Off you go, sweetheart, and be gentle around the puppy, you don't want to scare it."

"He," Fred says, looking up indignantly. "The puppy's a he."

"Alright. Be careful with him, yeah? Keep an eye on him for me, Tina."

"No problem," Mrs Rogers says, smiling at Fred as he starts a thumb war with Velma. I look at him as well and for a second my heart aches with envy. If only I could do the things he does.

And then Mom takes me back inside and I watch some cartoons again and eat some lunch.

I hear a clatter at the gate halfway through a cartoon and Mom walks up, looking out of the window. I manage to look as well and see Fred, walking up the street next to a brown puppy, holding the leash along with all the others. Shaggy's holding the end and Fred's stroking the puppy's head, laughing as he turns to lick Fred's hand. I smile as well, and Mom wheels me out to meet them at the gate.

"Hello! I see you got the puppy… Such a shame that Smokey's at the vet, she's such a gentle thing. Maybe they'll get along when she's back… Did you have a good time, Freddy?"

Fred nods, his eyes alight. The puppy barks and he carries on stroking the soft brown fur as he talks.

"His name's Scooby. Like the song, it was playing on the radio when he came in. Mrs Rogers said it was Frank Sin… Sinar… Sinarter?"

"Sinatra," Mom corrects, smiling. "Can Lucas have a stroke?"

Fred nods and guides Scooby towards me, keeping a firm hold on his lead and his hand still on the puppy's back. I lean forwards eagerly- and poke the puppy in the eye.

Scooby yelps. I gasp along with Shaggy. But Fred reaches out and puts his hand on my wrist, gently guiding my arm to stroke Scooby's head. He strokes my fingers across the silky fur three or four times, and then lets my hand rest on Scooby's back. The smile on my face is almost splitting it in two and Mom is beaming as well. Fred is smiling slightly, but it's a genuine smile. He made me very happy and he was happy from it as well.

Mom wheels me in and Fred comes in as well, reluctantly saying goodbye to Scooby and going straight up to his room, taking something out of his pocket. I peek in as Mom runs a flannel under the tap to wipe my face and see him pin something to his pin board. It's a picture of him and the others and Scooby at the pound, all gathered round and stroking the panting brown puppy in the middle. Fred's beam is so genuine, and I haven't seen anything that radiant from him at home for a long time. For the first time I wish that I was normal; not for me, for him.

I can never be mad at someone who I live with. Especially not my brother. Even though he's mean to me sometimes, he never really means it, and I always forgive him. Mom says I must be an angel for forgiving him each and every time.

I don't think so.

The next day, Fred wants to go and see Scooby immediately, but Mom insists that she has to walk him and leaves me with Dad. She takes ages to prepare me for being without her, and by the time they actually leave Fred is sulking. Mom tries to tickle him to lighten him up but he squirms away and stalks off down the road away from her. She runs after him and the last I see of them is him with a stormy expression on his face and her sighing at him to stop being so silly.

When they get back we eat lunch and although Dad tries to get Fred to talk about what he did at Shaggy's Fred is back in his silent mood. I think it's because Dad cut him off mid-sentence when he was talking to attend to me. That's when Fred's face soured, anyway.

"Come on, I said I was sorry," Dad says, leaning over. But he said that the last time too. And the time before that. And he hasn't stopped.

Fred gives a little sigh and vehemently slashes a baby potato in two.

Mom takes me out into the garden after lunch, and I quietly watch Fred swinging, not wanting him to know I'm watching. He thinks I'm asleep. I'm scared that if he knows I'm looking at him he'll stop.

He only stops when Mom calls him in for something, I don't hear what. I fall asleep when he stops.

Dinner is quiet, almost mute for our family. But afterwards Fred wants to watch something on TV and I want to watch something else. Fred's programme is all about aliens, which scare me. I'm scared because Mitchell told me once that if aliens landed then I'd die because I can't run. He was just joking but it made me scared. I was only little.

"But I never get to watch it!" Fred protests, trying to grab the remote as Mom holds it out of his reach. He swipes, misses and crashes onto the floor, landing on his neck. Mitchell winces. I gasp. Dad springs up to walk over to him. He isn't moving.

Then he looks up and I smile as I see that his eyes are dry.

"Ow…"

Dad pulls him up and carefully puts his hands on Fred's neck, looking over it, seeing if he's OK. Fred looks fine, just a little shell-shocked.

"You are silly, aren't you? Never mind, it's just a bit painful. Now be reasonable; can Lucas just watch his thing for once?"

"For once? He always gets what he wants."

Mom stands up suddenly, her nostrils flaring angrily, her face red.

"You know what? I'm just about fed up with you being so selfish, Frederick Jones! I ask if your brother can watch one thing and you protest and whinge and it's always all about you, isn't it, all about you and your moods and being silly and it's not on! I won't tolerate it any longer. You can go upstairs to your room and stay there!"

I gasp again. I can't believe how unfair she's being. Fred and I both know that it's never about Fred. It's always me. And the injustice of it burns in him.

That's why his eyes change, I think suddenly. In his eyes, to him, I am the injustice of it all. That's why he's mean to me.

He turns and suddenly yells, his eyes burning.

"No! It's never me! It's always him! You care more about him than you do about me and you always will! He's more precious, always will be! You don't care about me!"

"Fred!"

Fred turns and slams the door in Mom's face. She stands there for a second, getting her composure back, and then she opens it.

Fred is nowhere. The front door is open.

Mom shrieks and runs out of it. We're on a main road, that's why she's so het up. I think.

She rushes back in and pulls Dad out with her, shrieking to Mitchell to keep an eye on me. He nods and looks at me, shock on his face. He must see I feel puzzled and he shakes his head at me.

"Do you know what he's done, Lucas? He ran away."

I gurgle and Mitchell walks over and wheels me away from the window.

"I dunno if he'll come back. I hope so."

And then after a while Mom and Dad come back in, and Mom's crying so hard her face is a hazed blur of tears. Dad takes a phone and dials a number, saying he has to report a missing child. Mom sits down and manages to get out, "He's… he's go-o-one… I must be… the worst… mother… in the… world…" before she's sobbing too hard for me to get what she's saying.

I wish I could give her a hug.

And then I wish that I could find my brother.

The police come and they talk to Mom and Dad, using lots of long words that I don't understand. Mom is still crying and Dad's face is strange. Part of it's angry, part of it's anxious, and part of it doesn't know what to do.

Mitchell takes me upstairs and quietly puts me to bed, but I don't sleep. I lie with my head facing the ceiling and my arms on my chest, remembering the burning in Fred's eyes and wondering if he's going to come back.

Five hours later and Mom's waking me up, telling me that I'm going to come with them and that they're going to go and try and find Fred.

We walk for what seems like hours. I look round everywhere, swivelling my head when I can, seeing if I can see a flash of blond, a little bit of white jacket, maybe a glimpse of jeans. Nothing. A dog barks and I jump. Mom lifts a tarpaulin and sighs. Mitchell clings to the handles of my wheelchair hard, his eyes looking round as well but wide and frightened. Mitchell hates the dark.

And then Mom yelps.

"Sam! Mitchell! Lucas!"

We rush over, Mitchell pushing me so hard the wheels on my wheelchair squeal in protest. I can see something lying under a tarpaulin, but I can't make it out in the dark so I sit back as Mom pulls the tarp away and picks up the limp body of my brother. Dad puts his hand on Fred's forehead and grasps his hand.

"He's freezing, Penny. We need to get him into the warm, and quick."

Mom nods and beckons for us to follow her. I see Fred's head as it comes under a street lamp: deathly pale and almost sickly, his mouth slightly open but his eyes closed. I gurgle and Mitchell reaches down and puts his hand on my shoulder briefly. I'm shivering but it's nothing to do with the cold.

A policeman sees us walking back and Dad calls to them that we've got Fred. They rush over and one of them gently places Fred in the back of her car and presses her fingers against his wrist. Fred murmurs something and pulls his arm away, but he's weak and when she picks his hand up again he doesn't resist.

"He's cold, but not too cold. I would suggest taking him to hospital just in case…"

"No." Mom and Dad speak at the same time.

"We'll take him home. We have stuff to sort out." Dad's voice is firm as he lifts Fred gently from the back seat of the car and strokes his hair off his forehead. Fred kicks gently at Dad's leg and slides back into unconsciousness. The policewoman nods and gets into the car.

They carry him back between them, Mom with tear tracks on her face and Dad with a steely expression I haven't seen before. Mitchell is quiet. I gurgle and he leans forwards and whispers, "You OK?" I nod and he focuses back on Fred. There's something different and I try to think what. That's it. For pretty much the first time I'm not the centre of attention. Fred is.

We arrive home and Mitchell opens the door. Our little procession travels into the front room.

Dad lies Fred down on the sofa and Mom gets a hot water bottle and slides it under him. Mitchell sits down on an armchair and stares at Fred as though he's some kind of alien. I notice that his hair is damp above his white face and his hand shakes as it clings to an edge of the blanket.

The doorbell rings and Mrs Rogers walks in suddenly, seeing Fred lying on the sofa and skirting round me to get to Mom.

"They told me you'd found him."

Mom nods and Mrs Rogers leans over and looks into my brother's sleeping face. I gurgle and for once, everyone ignores me. I'm so happy and so frightened at the same time. He's safe- I think.

"Mmh… Huh?"

Fred's eyes suddenly flicker open and he focuses on Mrs Rogers as she steps back and Mom bends down to see eye-to-eye with him.

"Hello."

Fred blinks, and looks round. Dad looks back at him steadily. Mitchell stares at him. I meet his gaze and hold it. Mrs Rogers steps back and tactfully hovers just out of the door.

Mom suddenly leans forwards and pulls Fred into the hugest hug ever. Dad walks over and joins in, and so does Mitchell.

I think that I'll be left out. I'm so close I could reach out and touch them, but I'd end up hurting somebody.

Fred's eyes flick towards me. For a second I think that they're going to change again. But then he reaches out, a little smile on his face, and grasps my arm, pulling me forwards slightly to join in the group hug. I smile, a huge, genuine beam.

Maybe it's OK now.

Fred locks eyes with me and smiles, his old smile that I saw when he was little. I wondered if he still loved me before. If he still cared. But now I know that he always did, even though sometimes he didn't show it. He always cared, somewhere, deep down.

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A/N: Woot! Done it. Yay! :) Now, I'll put an epilogue up for what happens next. Review if you haven't already, and most importantly, I hope you enjoyed it! Jazzola :)


	2. Chapter 2

Fred's recovered from running away now, and it's been two weeks. Slowly, my family has changed, and for the good.

Mom and Dad finally accepted that there are two sides to every story, and listened to Fred's. At first they thought he was exaggerating, but after a bit of thought they realised he wasn't. They were angry with him for running away at first, but Fred just explained why.

"How else were you going to listen? I had to do something big to make you listen. If I hadn't you would have just told me off and sent me to my room. You would have thought I was just complaining and attention-seeking and I wasn't."

It was a valid and fair point, they said.

The first thing they did was to take Fred and Mitchell out to a theme park and leave me in the care of Mrs Roosevelt, an old lady who lives up the road and had a disabled son like me once, for the day. I can't go to theme parks and they scare me anyway.

Mrs Roosevelt is really nice and she treated me like an adult and didn't fuss over me the whole day. I like her a lot. I didn't mind being left with her at all. She could tell I was happy and she let me sleep when I got tired as well. I was happy when my family got back, ruffled and pink-cheeked from the brisk wind outside, but I had a good time and so did they. That was what I focused on.

Fred started being friendlier, talkative, more like his old self. I liked being around him more and he started talking with me, playing with me, helping to feed me at the table instead of sitting sullenly picking at his own food. He started making me laugh again rather than making me pity him. He still spends lots of time with his friends out of the house, but that's more because he's close to them than because he wanted to get away from Mom and Dad.

Now we're sitting out in the garden and Fred's playing idly with a blade of grass next to me. I'm allowed out of my wheelchair as long as he's there and I stay on my mat.

Fred notices I'm bored and reaches over to swish the blade of grass over my nose. I laugh as it tickles the tip of my nose and he laughs as well, stroking it down my face and letting it drag over my mouth and down my chin. I carry on laughing and he tickles my side like he used to do when we were little.

I never figured out why Fred always treated every day with me as though it was the last back then, why he always told me that if I left tonight he was my friend forever. I liked it, but I never really figured out why. Then he stopped and I thought he'd stopped caring for a while. But he didn't. He does that now, he started again when he was a bit better after his running away. I turn over and almost squash his arm, but he just wriggles away slightly and picks a dandelion, pressing it onto my forehead as I laugh harder. I love it when he's messing around with me and in a light mood, even though I still sometimes wake up in the middle of the night after having nightmares where he's lying on the sofa again and limp and pale and cold, and I reach out and touch him and he's like marble, hard and frosty and lifeless, and Mom whispers that he's dead. I wake up screaming and wake everyone else up, but they don't mind and I think Fred twigged they're about him because he always comes through to reassure me and calm me down.

His friends came over after he was found and they were playing with me as well, all of us, him lying on the sofa still and me in my wheelchair but all of us messing around and laughing and just being kids. Daphne smiled at me and said I have a very distinctive laugh. Fred just smiled as well and said he agreed. Shaggy tickled me to make me laugh and they laughed with me.

"I reckon Lucas should be like one of us," Velma said, smiling.

Fred nodded.

I don't know why he agreed and why the others said that. They normally don't let other people into their group. But I suppose he just wants me to be happy.

And I am. After all this, now I am.

I don't care anymore that I'm the way I am. I'd prefer to be this way than be any other way.

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A/N: I got a little sad writing this- the reason that Fred tells him that he's his friend every night is because Lucas has a very limited lifespan and he probably won't live to be in his twenties. That's also part of the reason that Fred says he should be like part of the gang. But I thought it was a nice ending, albeit a little tiny bit rushed. Don't hesitate to review and tell me what you think, I do a celebratory dance every time I get a review! (Not really, but almost. ;) ) Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it! Jazzola :)


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